review

THE FUNHOUSE

An unsung cult oddity from THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE director Tobe Hooper, THE FUNHOUSE is one of the few good slasher films to come out in the early 80s. It isn't perfect - few slasher films outside of BLACK CHRISTMAS and HALLOWEEN are - but it's a massively entertaining little flick that deserves a much bigger audience. It starts out with a parody of both HALLOWEEN and PSYCHO, an opening that would lead one to believe that THE FUNHOUSE is going to be one big joke, and meanders quite a bit before morphing into a full-throated horror film.


Tobe Hooper The Funhouse

Amy, her boyfriend Buzz, and their two friends, Richie and Liz, take off to the carnival one night even though Amy's parents have strictly forbidden it. They ride the rides and see the freaks before hitting on a grand idea. They will spend the night in the funhouse. What seems like a good idea turns into a nightmare when they witness the son of the funhouse operator strangle the carnival fortune teller. On their way to find an exit, they pass by the room where the dead fortune teller's body is lying. Richie, not the sharpest knife in the drawer, decides to pop in and steal the funhouse owner's money. Thanks to an unfortunate dropping of a lighter, the funhouse owner and his hideously deformed son realize they are not alone and set out to kill our frightened teens one by one.


Elizabeth Berridge The Funhouse

A fairly generic set-up, sure, but THE FUNHOUSE has one thing going for it that FRIDAY THE 13TH doesn't: a frickin' funhouse! I remember watching MY BLOODY VALENTINE when I was a kid and wondering why it took so long for someone to figure out that a mine would be an excellent place to stage a horror movie. The same idea crossed my mind a million times when I first saw this film, too. While Hooper never uses the location to it's full effect visually, the sound design on the film is incredible. Strange cackles and the sound of mechanized dolls, bumps and groans, grunts and wheezes swirl through the soundtrack only to be destroyed by the sound of an attraction blazing to life. It's a very effective tool for Hooper to use and it helps make THE FUNHOUSE a lot scarier than it would have been without it. It's just a shame that the funhouse itself is so small. We spend the majority of our time bouncing back and forth between the same five or six rooms. I imagine this was due to budgetary concerns - the only reason I can think of for having such a small series of sets to work with. THE FUNHOUSE was made cheaply and the set limitations really show.


The Funhouse slasher film

Another area in which THE FUNHOUSE fails is in the make-up effects department. The Geek - the deformed son of the funhouse operator - is pretty terrible looking but it is obviously nothing more than a mask and a wig. Hooper makes the mistake of keeping The Geek on-screen for way too long, giving everyone a good look at him whenever possible and this achieves nothing. When your main villain looks this poor, you want to keep him hidden from view as much as possible. After awhile, The Geek is simply no longer frightening and that is largely due to the piss-poor make-up job.


The Funhouse Tobe Hooper

Strangely enough, this is a slasher film featuring actors who actually do a passable job acting. Elizabeth Berridge - who would later go on to play Constanze in Milos Forman's AMADEUS - is one of the more convincing final girls in the history of the slasher film. She isn't given much to do - she does, however, show her breasts more than 99% of every other final girl in slasher film history - but she does it all rather well and, thanks to her, the audience can get involved with the story. The other notable performance in the film is that of Kevin Conway. Like THE TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE, THE FUNHOUSE features a remarkably warped family at it's core. The funhouse operator is a single father trying to do right by his murderous, deformed son. His wife has either left him or is dead and his only other child is in a jar at the freak show exhibit. Conway's performance isn't showy and it certainly isn't deep but he invests a great deal of emotion in it and it really shows. Between Berridge and Conway, there's more acting talent on display in THE FUNHOUSE than the entirety of the FRIDAY THE 13TH series.


The Funhouse

This is not a gore flick, by the way. Don't come expecting gallons of blood. There's a post-death axe to the head and a nice sword through the gut gag but overall this is pretty tame stuff. I don't mind though because the overall feel of the flick is dead on. It's fun and breezy stuff with a few good scares and a nice, original setting. THE FUNHOUSE might not be greatest slasher film out there but it does it's job well and is genuinely likeable.


Recommended.



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